Because I keep seeing literary allusions to Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, I decided to read the book. While I recognize the critical acclaim this book has generated, I personally was not impressed. I found it to be a muddled stream-of-consciousness mess. I spend the beginning of the book trying to figure out what the heck was going on, the middle of the book trying to figure out what the heck was going on, and at the end of the book I was still trying to figure out what the heck was going on. In my opinion, in terms of quality and clarity of prose, authors like, for example, John Steinbeck and Ernest Hemingway would wipe the floor with Conrad.

Whatever you do, do not attempt to read The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne.

It's near impossible to follow. Supposed to read like an autobiography of sorts, but instead turns into a gigantic cluster**** because he can't stay on the story line for more than a page without having to digress and write 5 pages on why one little thing happened how it did.

Then there's an entire chapter devoted to why he has to digress. It's a mess.

Not much is going on. Despite the racist undertones, I likeHeart if Darkness very much and I do think that Conrad is a great stylist. I'm not sure, however, if Conrad would agree with the reception by both the critics and the readers over the years. To an extent, the novel has become much more than it - or Conrad - ever intended it to be, but that's just how literature works sometimes, and it doesn't really matter if Conrad likes the interpretations or not. The novel is a bit like Kafka without trying to be Kafka.

MRandall25 wrote:Whatever you do, do not attempt to read The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne.

It's near impossible to follow. Supposed to read like an autobiography of sorts, but instead turns into a gigantic cluster**** because he can't stay on the story line for more than a page without having to digress and write 5 pages on why one little thing happened how it did.

Then there's an entire chapter devoted to why he has to digress. It's a mess.

Being unilingual, I didn't like how he kept going into French, otherwise I thought it was pretty funny. There wasn't really supposed to be anything to follow, it was just about his crazy family and his thoughts.

Gaucho wrote:Not much is going on. Despite the racist undertones, I likeHeart if Darkness very much and I do think that Conrad is a great stylist. I'm not sure, however, if Conrad would agree with the reception by both the critics and the readers over the years. To an extent, the novel has become much more than it - or Conrad - ever intended it to be, but that's just how literature works sometimes, and it doesn't really matter if Conrad likes the interpretations or not. The novel is a bit like Kafka without trying to be Kafka.

I have it on the kindle, i'm actually reading the Trial right now on the Kindle and Heart of Darkness is on deck.

Godric wrote:Faulkner, Tolstoy, and A. Huxley are far and away my favorite authors on what I've read in the last couple years

Random, I know, but I was wondering if anyone could recommend someone

I assume you've read Dosteovsky, but I would certainly suggest him for your taste. I've been reading all classics lately so I probably can't tell you anything you haven't heard before, but as for modern stuff, I highly recommend tackling Infinite Jest, and this book have been highly recommended by a friend of mine.http://www.amazon.com/HHhH-Novel-Lauren ... 0374169918

jmh470 wrote:Having endured Dune recently, I say turn back. The world he created is interesting enough, but I found Herbert's characters too cliche and his writing too tedious. Not a Sci-fi classic for me.

Herbert beats the political drum aspects of the realm way too in-depth for those looking for a quality science fiction read, but its not daunting--just boring at times.

Godric wrote:Faulkner, Tolstoy, and A. Huxley are far and away my favorite authors on what I've read in the last couple years

Random, I know, but I was wondering if anyone could recommend someone

I assume you've read Dosteovsky, but I would certainly suggest him for your taste. I've been reading all classics lately so I probably can't tell you anything you haven't heard before, but as for modern stuff, I highly recommend tackling Infinite Jest, and this book have been highly recommended by a friend of mine.http://www.amazon.com/HHhH-Novel-Lauren ... 0374169918

Infinite Jest has been sitting on my shelf like a brick for some time now. Literally. Since everything else by Wallace ranges from terrific to tedious I've been reluctant to tackle that monster. Next year maybe.

Godric wrote:Faulkner, Tolstoy, and A. Huxley are far and away my favorite authors on what I've read in the last couple years

Random, I know, but I was wondering if anyone could recommend someone

I assume you've read Dosteovsky, but I would certainly suggest him for your taste. I've been reading all classics lately so I probably can't tell you anything you haven't heard before, but as for modern stuff, I highly recommend tackling Infinite Jest, and this book have been highly recommended by a friend of mine.http://www.amazon.com/HHhH-Novel-Lauren ... 0374169918

Infinite Jest has been sitting on my shelf like a brick for some time now. Literally. Since everything else by Wallace ranges from terrific to tedious I've been reluctant to tackle that monster. Next year maybe.

ditto on McCarthy (Blood Meridian is my personal fave and have noted as such in the thread), Greene (Power and the Glory), and Beckett (Godot). I'll add:

A Canticle for Lebowitz (Walter Miller)This Way to the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen (Tadeusz Borowski)All Quiet on the Western Front (Remarque)Love in the Time of Cholera (GG Marquez)Pygmalion (Shaw)Mrs. Dalloway (Woolf)The Awakening (Chopin...for the feminist in us all)In Cold Blood (Capote)Jude the Obscure (Hardy) Harrison Bergeron (Vonnegut)The Importance of Being Earnest (Wilde)

Have you read any other Woolf? I read To the Lighthouse this year and had immense trouble following it....so I'm now not interested in trying anything else from her...unless I learn that her other stuff is more accessible (nice way of putting easier)

Troy Loney wrote:Have you read any other Woolf? I read To the Lighthouse this year and had immense trouble following it....so I'm now interested in trying anything else from her...unless I learn that her other stuff is more accessible (nice way of putting easier)

To the Lighthouse is a mediocre attempt at stream of consciousness--its not worth the effort, in my opinion. The Waves is okay but nothing fantastic.

I think i'm actually going to free up some time with the move i'm making this weekend. I can't decide if I should dust off the 360 or start reading again. I have 35-40 books that are just sitting in a box waiting to be read.

Troy Loney wrote:Have you read any other Woolf? I read To the Lighthouse this year and had immense trouble following it....so I'm now interested in trying anything else from her...unless I learn that her other stuff is more accessible (nice way of putting easier)

To the Lighthouse is a mediocre attempt at stream of consciousness--its not worth the effort, in my opinion. The Waves is okay but nothing fantastic.

The Years is probably my 2nd favorite behind Mrs. Dalloway.

That's good to know, i'll probably get to Mrs Dalloway at some point.

On a somewhat related note, is anyone familiar with what makes a book available for free and not? Woolf for instance has several of her books on the prject gutenberg site, but not all of them? Why?

Read it a while back and have been thinking about picking it back up. Good read

At the center of this invigorating novel are two unlikely friends, Archie Jones and Samad Iqbal. Hapless veterans of World War II, Archie and Samad and their families become agents of England’s irrevocable transformation. A second marriage to Clara Bowden, a beautiful, albeit tooth-challenged, Jamaican half his age, quite literally gives Archie a second lease on life, and produces Irie, a knowing child whose personality doesn’t quite match her name (Jamaican for “no problem”). Samad’s late-in-life arranged marriage (he had to wait for his bride to be born), produces twin sons whose separate paths confound Iqbal’s every effort to direct them, and a renewed, if selective, submission to his Islamic faith. Set against London’s racial and cultural tapestry, venturing across the former empire and into the past as it barrels toward the future, White Teeth revels in the ecstatic hodgepodge of modern life, flirting with disaster, confounding expectations, and embracing the comedy of daily existence.